Amoretti: Sonnet 22

Amoretti: Sonnet 22 Lyrics

This holy season fit to fast and pray,
Men to devotion ought to be inclynd:
therefore, I lykewise on so holy day,
for my sweet Saynt some service fit will find.
Her temple fayre is built within my mind,
in which her glorious ymage placed is,
on which my thoughts doo day and night attend
lyke sacred priests that never thinke amisse.
There I to her as th'author of my blisse,
will builde an altar to appease her yre:
and on the same my hart will sacrifise,
burning in flames of pure and chast desyre:
The which vouchsafe O goddesse to accept,amongst thy deerest relicks to be kept.

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About “Amoretti: Sonnet 22”

Sonnet 68 is clearly an Easter sonnet, and it occurs 47 sonnets after this one (inclusively); since that would correspond to the number of days between Ash Wednesday and Easter, some readers take this sonnet to be the Ash Wednesday opening of a Lenten sequence that runs from 22-68 (see sonnet 62 likewise).

The Lenten tone of this sonnet is certainly reflected in the first line—the “holy season fit to fast and pray"—but the poet will offer us instead a deep vision of the impurity of his love (corrected by the time we get to Holy Week with sonnet 62), couched in sacred terms.